


rocks on the river

by BlimpFruit



Category: Fire Emblem: If | Fire Emblem: Fates
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Gen, Timeloops, corrin sure as hell doesn’t know, what the fuck is a revelation
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-02
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-11-07 20:37:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,397
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17967629
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlimpFruit/pseuds/BlimpFruit
Summary: You’ve long since grown weary of the two paths you have to pick. Friends, family, foes, it all gets jumbled across the paths and nothing means anything anymore.Well.That’s not entirely true, is it? There’s been a few who’ve stuck by your side no matter what you do.





	rocks on the river

You’ve been doing this over and over and over. It’s been so long that it’s all blended in your head. White and black, dark and light. Trying to find the exit to this endless labyrinth that you refuse to move on from, trying to find the one perfect path that ends things. 

You’ve long since grown weary of the two paths you have to pick. Friends, family, foes, it all gets jumbled across the paths and nothing means anything anymore.

Well.

That’s not entirely true, is it? There’s been a few who’ve stuck by your side no matter what you do. The rocks in the rivers you’re adrift on. If it weren’t for their constant presence, you’d have lost your mind a long time ago.

First, there’s him and her. Even though they’re as different as can be, with his acid tongue and her bumbling, you can’t not think of them as a pair. They’re the ones who’ve always been by your side, after all. What you can’t understand is their devotion to you. They’ve both suffered so much just for being your servants, so why do they always follow you? Sometimes the anger bubbles up in you when she’s crying over having smashed a plate or he’s snarling over something not being done perfectly, and you just want to rip their damned uniforms off and shake them until they understand that all you’ve ever wanted from them is their friendship and nothing more. It’d be so much easier if they were like her sister (she burns she burns it’s burned into your head why do you keep tormenting her) and secretly despised you all this time, but no, even the one you leave behind when you make the decision, both him or her, always finds their way across the dimensions to you. You don’t deserve them but you’re too selfish to not love them.

Your memories have become a patchwork, a hodgepodge of nonsense. It’s something that’s stopped bothering you for the most part, except for with him. After everything he’s done for you, he deserves to have at least one corner carved out in your head, but you keep forgetting over and over and over. Is your need for self-pity, to be alone, so great that you have to erase the memory of your friend that made your childhood that much more bearable? Being around him makes you want to choke. He becomes a knight, he dedicates his life just to seeing you again, but you can’t even be bothered to keep him in your thoughts? He turns his back on his country for you without a second thought, but you’ve done nothing to deserve that devotion. Maybe if you ever make your way out of this, you can start repaying him.

He’s quiet by nature, even beyond his profession. Nevertheless, by this point you can tell when he’s observing from the shadow. It’s comforting, his constant watching over you. He’s the one that inspires you, reminding you that you can change things if you try, that maybe there is some escape. And of course, you owe it to him to continue. After all, you managed to ruin his life without even trying. The first time after he gave himself up to get you back on the cliff, you finally bothered to actually look into his eyes and find the self-loathing that he’s buried inside, the poisonous vines whose seeds you planted. After that, you’ve always made it a priority to “forgive” him so he can forgive himself, and since then he’s never done something so stupid as to think your life was worth more than his. Whenever he turns against everything he has just because he believes in your commitment to ending the war without causing more death, you get the motivation to try one more time. He’s a better retainer than you could ever ask for.

She doesn’t have any relation to you, but that’s what makes this harder. Her life and yours have nothing to do with each other, and that’s the most unfair part. Why is it that you’re left untouched by the war you start through your idiocy, but she, just an innocent village girl, loses everyone she ever knew? And how many more people that you don’t ever meet also have their lives ripped apart because of you? But of course, pitying her is the biggest mistake you could make. Even when she has nothing left, even when she’s surrounded by royals and soldiers and strangers who are all above her, she finds the capacity to keep her head up on and keep on going. She always blossoms into a fearsome fighter, despite how shy and ineffectual she is at the start. Everyone is always left in awe at her power, including you, but you want to scream. She shouldn’t need to become what she does if you could just stop destroying her life again and again. In the end, you’re just ashamed. Because if you were even a tenth of the person she was, you would have had the strength to end this a long time ago.

He’s always one of the last ones you meet, but that doesn’t make him any less dear to you. After all, you have a lot in common, even if you can’t admit it to him. You’ve both caused so much pain to so many innocents, and have both accepted that you’re terrible people for it. And you’re both fighting on impossible quests, with his lost kingdom and your... whatever it is you’re trying to do anymore. You’ve made sure to let him confront the man who burned his country whenever you could. There’s not enough justice in the world, but seeing him finally get a modicum of peace makes you feel like it can be alright sometimes. It tears your heart in two whenever you see him eating alone as if he’s worth less than you or anyone else for what’s he had to do, when in reality it should be you who should be shunned. More than anyone else, he deserves the second chance, and that’s why you’ve let him come along, even if your siblings disapprove. (The tired smile on his face when he accepted his fate before you executed him for the first and last time will never leave your nightmares. It’s a reminder that no matter what others think, you truly are terrible at the core.)

And of course, of course of course of course, there’s her. Her. She confuses you and infuriates you and enchants you and a million other things. On the one hand, you always have a kinship with her. She’s been torn between the kingdoms of light and dark just as you have (you try to ignore that it’s only because of you that it happened to her). She’s always been the one you’ve leaned on the most, even if you haven’t told her everything. And it just feels like there’s some bond between you two that you can’t explain. You’re not like her, her with her otherworldly singing and reserved demeanor, and you with your jagged edges and draconic spirit, but somehow there’s some invisible connection. Not just in how neither of you fit in black or white, but that you’re both cut from the same gray cloth. And that’s what drives you insane. You’re so sure that what she knows could save you from this hell, but she’s a locked box. Her song, that strange land of floating islands, all of it are pieces to the puzzle you’re trying to put together. She always dodges your questions and you can never bring yourself to push harder when you’re also hiding things. But that’s the biggest mystery. It’d be so simple if she just didn’t trust you. But if she didn’t, then why does she insist on torturing herself and hurting and dying for you no matter what you do? What’s the difference between light and dark if they both lead to a world where she’s gone? (If you’re being honest, she’s the reason you haven’t given up. You can’t accept a world where she isn’t alive to be happy in it.)

And so, you continue to walk this path, weary soul that you are. Perhaps someday you’ll find the road you’ve not taken, the one that will finally end this loop.

**Author's Note:**

> written on a long bus ride


End file.
